Mozart's Il sogno di Scipione

In 54 BCE Cicero, the Roman Republic's greatest writer, created The Dream of Scipio, a singular work in which he describes an allegory-laden dream of Scipio Aemilianus, the Roman general who had brought Carthage to ruin. Centuries later, a talented young musician named Mozart found himself captivated by this curious tale and composed, to a libretto by Metastasio, the opera Il sogno di Scipione.

The deceptively simple plot conceals a weighty drama about a man called to choose between action and hope, Fortune and Constancy, in the guise of two young women who come to the slumbering Scipio and offer to accompany him throughout his life—under the condition, laid out by the goddesses, that he choose only one of them. Although torn between the two, Scipio chooses Constancy—who, like a rock in the sea, will be able to withstand even the most catastrophic storms.

This staging from the Teatro Malibran in Venice seems to share Scipio's opinion, leaving nothing to chance: their troupe, led by Elena Barbalich and Federico Maria Sardelli, includes the talents of Valentino Buzza, Francesca Boncompagni, and Bernarda Bobro, who put on the production of our dreams.